The thing is, while January 6th was gross and embarrassing and shameful, I don't think it's really convincing for some to portray it like January 6 almost ended democracy. I don't think there's a scenario that anyone actually believes in which the rioters go in, kill Mike Pence, establish a fortified defense of the capitol, and Trump is president today and buffalo head guy is vice president. Unless we hear that Trump had the armed forces on his side, that's just a non starter to me. January 6 could have been a LOT worse, and it still wouldn't have ended democracy or installed Trump as monarch. Ultimately even if it got as bad as it could have, with members of congress slaughtered or something, that ultimately becomes a law enforcement operation, and one way or another, that's one thing we know how to bring a resolution to in this country.
(That doesn't mean Trump can't be held responsible for TRYING to make that happen, he can be. Just that there was no "success" outcome of January 6th that is the end of Democracy or our institutions)
But I feel like the more dramatic aspect of January 6 obscures the scarier part. The shenanigans around false electors and states not certifying election results is the much more salient point and more concerning to me. Had that happened, had Georgia and Arizona governors respondent as Trump wanted, or had this scheme of Clark's been executed, or Pence had not certified the election...now you are talking about a real mess and a constitutional crisis that we'd still be trying to crawl out of today. No, I don't believe that would have ultimately succeeded, but imagine the "Florida recount" situation, but for years, the damage would be extraordinary. To me, this was the real threat behind Trump's actions, not January 6.
I mean, our institutions did hold, and it's no small thing to ignore that partisan Republicans from Trump appointed judges, to Trump Justice Department staff, to hard right Georgia governors and election officials, to Pence himself, stood in the breach and prevented any traction. That says something to the stability of our system. But to my knowledge, nobody ever tried to actually test the system like Trump did. There was no real guarantee it would hold, and I'm not sure you can be sure it holds every time.
It's very worthy to ask ourselves how we safeguard those firewalls in the future, and how we hold responsible those that would try to undermine them like Trump did.